Ring of Honor Review - June 27, 2024

By Graham "GSM" Matthews

Lee Johnson def. Alex Reyn​olds

Yes, the big follow-up to Johnson’s strong showing against Kyle Fletcher in last week’s two-out-of-three falls main event for the ROH World Television Championship was a match with Alex Reynolds of all people. I don’t know what other “big” stars Ring of Honor has currently that Johnson could’ve faced instead, but The Dark Order doesn’t exactly pique my interest these days. Their match was fine yet needlessly competitive. At least it got Johnson back in the win column.

Marina Shafir def. Erica Leigh by Referee Stoppage

The build of Shafir continues. If you’ve seen one of her enhancement matches, you’ve practically seen them all, but this was serviceable and thankfully kept brief. I believe the submission hold she used to beat Leigh was new, so that was cool. The biggest issue with Shafir’s presentation is that she’s dreadfully boring and can’t cut promos. Her vignettes have worked well, but that’s the only thing I’ve found remotely interesting about her in ages.

The Righteous and Lance Archer def. Duke Davis, Victor Benjamin and Ganon Jones Jr.

You can pretty much take anything I’ve ever said about any squash match The Righteous and Archer have ever had together and apply it to this match and it would most likely be the exact same thing. It’s a shame because I like all three guys and thought their pairing had potential when they joined forces last year, but they’ve done absolutely nothing and their trio is even more pointless now that the ROH World Six-Man Tag Team Championship is no more. As such, this match was pointless, too.

Taya Valkyrie def. Trish Adora

Neither of these women are involved in anything at the moment, so this seemed like a showcase for the two of them more than anything else. They had a nice match and made the most of the time they had, even though the crowd largely sat on their hands. Leyla Hirsh and Diamante furthered their feud with a backstage segment on this show, so why not start a storyline with Valkyrie and Adora to give them something to do?

ROH World Women's Television Champion Billie Starkz def. Angelica Risk in an ROH World Women's Championship Proving Ground Match

Starkz appeared at the very start of the show in a backstage segment with Athena and Lexy Nair where Athena said the “injury” she sustained last week would delay her recovery even more, so there’s your confirmation that the other “injury” she sustained from several weeks ago was indeed not real or at least is being exaggerated. This was a straightforward squash for Starkz. If Athena faces Queen Aminata at Death Before Dishonor, I assume Starkz would defend her title against Red Velvet.

ROH World Champion Mark Briscoe def. ROH World Television Champion Kyle Fletcher (ROH World Television Championship Wasn't Short)

This stemmed from Fletcher pinning Briscoe in that recent tag team match on Dynamite. I’m glad that actually amounted to something and wasn’t forgotten about because it would have been silly for the person who pinned the ROH World Champion to not get a title opportunity. Of course, Fletcher was never going to win here, but they had a great match. It was refreshing to have Briscoe back in action on ROH TV for the first time in a while.

Overall Show

Not only was the show back to being just over an hour long this week (it was almost two hours last week), we got a second straight meaningful main event. That’s a significant upgrade for ROH TV in my book and worth praising. Briscoe vs. Fletcher stood out, and although the rest of the show was what you’d usually expect out of ROH TV, the stuff with Athena was encouraging because it implied she isn’t actually hurt. How Tony Khan plans to fill out the rest of the Death Before Dishonor card is the question.

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